A far cry from my usual New Year’s Eve celebrations, which tend to consist of going to my local high street and making a fool out of myself whilst fuelled by Jägerbombs and kebabs, I decided to see in 2014 in style. The Big Apple, a place “so good they named it twice”, The City that Never Sleeps: call it what you will, I knew this was going to be the experience of a lifetime.

I went to Times Square to see the world famous Ball Drop. An event so famous that I had not heard of it until my friend insisted I watch the eponymous rom-com New Year’s Eve. Unfortunately, I fell asleep watching the film but I anticipated the real thing would be worth staying awake for. The ball drop involves a humongous ball suspended among the twinkling lights, towering skyscrapers and flashing adverts of Times Square, which descends at midnight to a gathering of over a million spectators.

With this year’s bill boasting performances from Miley Cyrus, Blondie and Macklemore (with the odd country singer for good measure, who all the Americans seemed to love) it was guaranteed to be a memorable start to the New Year. Miley was her usual self, performing a heart-felt rendition of Wrecking Ball, although there was no nudity or swinging from said wrecking ball, or the Times Square ball for that matter.

Doing a countdown with 1 million other people was certainly special but amidst the crowds and the streams of fireworks and confetti, embarrassingly the ball actually dropping passed me by. Still, while it is neither cultured nor intimate, and almost painfully cheesy and commercialised, New Year in the Big Apple is definitely worth a bite.

Bridget McClean

Photo: Property of timeout.com